Friendships

Virginia’s Susan Tilt kept a sewing machine in her room at Shrine Mont. A multi-talented artist who specializes in liturgical art, Susan spent her spare moments finishing a quilted wall hanging for an Episcopal Church Visual Arts exhibit. The stunning piece was based on a series of gesture drawings from a figure class that she had taken.

Angela Tompkins has been Susan’s Shrine Mont table mate for years. In a touching tribute to her friend’s art, Angela created a small polymer clay painting of Susan’s quilt. Spontaneous acts of kindness and friendship like these that we express in our art are often more powerful than our most studied and carefully considered efforts.

Clarification: There are many ways to transfer images to polymer clay – gin, water, special papers, special sauces. My hat is off to anyone who can spit, sip or slide their images onto the clay. Yesterday’s Laurie Prophater may have a new twist.

Oh, my gosh — knock me over with a feather with Donna Kato’s “Things” on her site. She confesses that she has the attention span of a gnat. I bet that’s not quite the case — how can you achieve art like this without laser focus and an amazing attention to detail — but rather she has ten thousand wonderful ideas, and there’s only so much time to get to them all, so she’s moving from one to the next at a rapid-fire pace. That’s not the attention span of a gnat — that’s creative genius, pure and simple. How lucky we are that Donna not only creates and inspires and takes the clay to such delightful new places, but shares so much as well. Bravo, Donna. Many thanks.

I use a very simple transfer method that requires an inkjet printer, avery t-shirt transfer paper and plain white sculpey. The only time it doesn’t work is if there are hidden air bubbles in the clay. I would be happy to share the technique with any clay artist who likes things simple.